50 Fun Facts About Freedom Fighters

In which present-day country is Banga, the Lyallpur village where Bhagat Singh was born in 1907?

Pakistan holds both ends of Bhagat Singh's life: Banga, his birth village in Lyallpur district, and Lahore, where he was hanged in 1931 at a spot now called Shadman Chowk.

On which island, then a Japanese colony, did the bomber carrying Subhas Chandra Bose crash in August 1945?

Taiwan's Taihoku airfield, now Taipei's Songshan Airport, is where the overloaded bomber crashed on 18 August 1945, three days after Japan's surrender. Bose died of his burns that night.

Which lender, registered in Lahore in 1894, had Lala Lajpat Rai closely involved in running it in its early years?

Punjab National Bank opened for business in Lahore's Anarkali Bazaar in April 1895 and moved its head office to Delhi weeks before Partition in 1947.

Which 2022 blockbuster imagines rebels Alluri Sitarama Raju and Komaram Bheem as friends in 1920s Delhi?

RRR, from Baahubali director S. S. Rajamouli, is pure invention: the two men never met, Raju fighting the British in the Andhra hills and Bheem the Nizam of Hyderabad.

Which star returned from a four-year break to play sepoy Mangal Pandey in the 2005 film 'The Rising'?

Aamir Khan had not appeared on screen since Dil Chahta Hai in 2001; the film premiered at Cannes and ended 2005 as Hindi cinema's fourth-biggest earner.

In which German city did Bhikaji Cama unfurl an early Indian flag at an international workers' congress in 1907?

Stuttgart made Cama the first person to hoist an Indian flag abroad; the banner was smuggled home by Indulal Yagnik and now sits in a Pune library.

Which Hindu festival did Tilak make a mass public event in Pune in 1893, dodging British curbs on assembly?

Ganesh Chaturthi had shrunk to a household rite under the Raj; Tilak picked Ganesha as 'the god for everybody' to unite Brahmins and non-Brahmins against colonial rule.

Which city's Dum Dum airport was renamed after Subhas Chandra Bose in 1995, the year it gained a second terminal?

Kolkata's airport began as an open ground beside a Royal Artillery armoury at Dum Dum; Bose was born in Cuttack but built his political career in Bengal's capital.

Which examination did Subhas Chandra Bose pass in 1920, placing fourth, only to resign from it within a year?

The Indian Civil Service was the Raj's elite cadre; Bose wrote to Edwin Montagu in April 1921 asking to be struck off its list of probationers, to his father's dismay.

In which Prayagraj garden, since renamed for him, did Chandra Shekhar Azad shoot himself with his last bullet in 1931?

Alfred Park, laid out in 1870 for a royal visit, saw Azad keep his vow never to be taken alive after a tip-off brought police to his meeting with an aide on 27 February 1931.

Which 1925 train robbery near Lucknow, targeting government cash, led to the hanging of Bismil and Ashfaqulla Khan?

Kakori's raiders took only the guard's cash bags, about 8,000 rupees bound for the treasury, yet four men were hanged in December 1927 after appeals that reached the Privy Council.

India marks Martyrs' Day on 23 March for the 1931 hanging of Bhagat Singh alongside which two comrades?

Sukhdev and Rajguru went to the gallows with Bhagat Singh at 7:30 pm, eleven hours ahead of schedule; all three had been convicted of killing a Lahore police officer.

Which party did Subhas Chandra Bose set up in June 1939, weeks after being forced out of the Congress presidency?

The Forward Bloc was meant to gather the Congress left nationwide, but its real base was Bengal, where it still contests elections more than eight decades on.

Which Andaman prison, 'Kala Pani' to its inmates, held V. D. Savarkar from 1911 on a 50-year sentence?

Cellular Jail took its name from its rows of solitary cells; Savarkar filed his first clemency petition a month after arriving in 1911 and was shifted to the mainland in 1921.

Which birth name, an epithet of the Ganges, did the future Rani of Jhansi receive from her parents in Varanasi?

Manikarnika, shortened to Manu at home, lost her mother at four and grew up at the exiled Peshwa's court in Bithur, where she reportedly learned riding, fencing and shooting.

Which 1928 no-tax campaign in Gujarat, led by Vallabhbhai Patel, earned him the title 'Sardar' from its women?

The Bardoli Satyagraha began on 12 February 1928 against a steep revenue hike and was settled by August; 'Sardar' means chief or leader in Gujarati.

Which 2006 film by Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra, India's Oscar entry that year, casts students as Bhagat Singh and Azad?

Rang De Basanti took Mehra seven years to develop; its students end up shooting a defence minister and are gunned down inside a radio station they have seized.

What did the Centre name 23 January, Subhas Chandra Bose's birthday, when it first marked the day in 2021?

Parakram Diwas, 'Day of Valour', was announced on 19 January 2021 over objections from Bose's family, who had asked for Deshprem Divas, 'Day of Patriotism', and West Bengal, which wanted Deshnayak Divas.

Which 'Frontier Gandhi', founder of the Khudai Khidmatgar 'Red Shirts', received the Bharat Ratna in 1987?

Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan felt betrayed when Congress accepted Partition without consulting his Pashtun movement, telling its leaders 'you have thrown us to the wolves'.

In which country did Indian Legion soldiers, recruited from prisoners of war, first hail Bose as 'Netaji' in 1942?

Germany's Special Bureau for India in Berlin used the title too; Bose had reached Europe via Kabul and Moscow after slipping British surveillance at home in January 1941.

At which Delhi landmark were three INA officers court-martialled in late 1945, with Nehru joining their defence team?

The Red Fort trials backfired on the British: public fury at seeing a Hindu, a Muslim and a Sikh officer prosecuted together spread to a naval mutiny in early 1946.

Which US city held the Yugantar Ashram on Hill Street, the Ghadar Party's headquarters and press from 1913?

San Francisco's Ghadar press preached armed revolt to Punjabi immigrants along the Pacific coast; the party's German-backed plots ended in a sensational 1917 trial in the same city.

Which tribal rebel, dead in jail at 24 in 1900, is honoured every 15 November as Janjatiya Gaurav Divas?

Birsa Munda's portrait hangs in Parliament's museum; some 7,000 followers gathered at Christmas 1899 to launch his 'Ulgulan', or Great Tumult, across the Chota Nagpur hills.

Which theosophist launched the All India Home Rule League with Tilak in 1916 and presided over Congress a year later?

Annie Besant was the first woman to head Congress, taking the chair in December 1917 months after the British interned her at a hill station, where she defiantly flew a red-and-green flag.

Which Marathi weekly did Tilak found in January 1881, alongside its English-language sister paper Mahratta?

Kesari, meaning 'Lion', is still printed in Pune today, though by the 1940s it had drifted from Tilak's nationalism to become the paper of the Hindu Mahasabha and the RSS.

Which observance falls on 13 February in India, the birthday of poet-politician Sarojini Naidu?

National Women's Day honours Naidu, who published her first poetry collection, The Golden Threshold, in London in 1905 and presided over Congress twenty years later.

Which revolutionary died in Lahore's Borstal Jail in 1929 after a 63-day hunger strike for political-prisoner status?

Jatin Das began his fast on 13 July 1929 alongside Bhagat Singh, demanding that political prisoners be treated better than common convicts; he died on 13 September.

Which probationary police officer did Bhagat Singh's group kill in Lahore in 1928, mistaking him for James Scott?

John Saunders was felled by a single shot from across the street; the group had wanted Scott, the superintendent blamed for the lathi charge that preceded Lala Lajpat Rai's death.

Which adopted son of the last Peshwa, denied his father's pension by the Company, led the rebels at Kanpur in 1857?

Nana Saheb vanished after the British retook Kanpur, and rumours placed him in Nepal for decades; his killing of surrendered garrison survivors made him Britain's most hated rebel.

Which rebel general, beaten at the Betwa while trying to relieve Jhansi in 1858, was executed at Sipri in April 1859?

Tatya Tope, born Ramachandra Panduranga near Nasik, kept a guerrilla war going for months after Gwalior fell; a stubborn legend insists another man was hanged in his place.

Which Awadh queen ruled for her young son during the 1857 fight for Lucknow, then died in Kathmandu exile in 1879?

Begum Hazrat Mahal lies in an unmarked grave beside Kathmandu's Jama Masjid; Nepal's Rana prime minister first refused her asylum, and the British pardoned her son only in 1887.

In which Bihar town did teenage Khudiram Bose bomb the wrong carriage in 1908, missing magistrate Kingsford?

Muzaffarpur's jail, where Khudiram was hanged on 11 August 1908 aged 18, now bears his name; the bomb killed two British women, and his accomplice Prafulla Chaki shot himself.

Which schoolteacher, 'Master Da' to his followers, led the April 1930 raid on the Chittagong armoury?

Surya Sen was hanged in January 1934 after years on the run; the raid was followed by a fierce battle in which 12 revolutionaries and more than 80 soldiers died.

Which Indian student shot Sir William Curzon Wyllie dead in London in 1909 and was hanged at Pentonville?

Madan Lal Dhingra fired five shots into Curzon Wyllie's face and two more into a Parsi doctor who tried to intervene; his own father had disowned him in newspaper adverts.

Off which island did Subhas Chandra Bose move from the U-boat U-180 to a Japanese submarine in 1943?

Madagascar's southeast waters were where Bose climbed into the I-29 after rounding the Cape of Good Hope; he landed at Sabang in Japanese-held Sumatra on 6 May 1943 and flew on to Tokyo.

Which INA captain, who led its women's regiment, was the left's candidate for President of India in 2002?

Lakshmi Sahgal, a doctor in Singapore when Bose recruited her, was the first woman to stand for India's presidency; four left parties nominated her and she lost to Kalam.

Whom did Subhas Chandra Bose defeat for the Congress presidency at Tripuri in 1939, the candidate Gandhi had backed?

Pattabhi Sitaramayya, an Andhra Congressman, was Gandhi's pick; after the loss most of the Working Committee resigned in protest and Bose was out of the presidency within months.

Which Gujarat salt works saw police club Sarojini Naidu's marchers in May 1930 as reporter Webb Miller looked on?

Dharasana's beatings, 320 injured by Miller's count, went round the world's newspapers and did more for the salt campaign than the march before them; Gandhi was already in jail.

At which Gujarat city's 1907 session did Congress split into Moderates and Tilak's Extremists, reuniting only in 1916?

Surat's session collapsed into uproar after a voice vote; the Moderates then met in secret and expelled the radicals, who had wanted the gathering held in Nagpur instead.

Which body did Gokhale found in Pune in June 1905 to harness educated youth for full-time patriotic work?

The Servants of India Society still exists and in 1930 set up Pune's Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics; Gandhi, who called Gokhale his political guru, sought to join it on returning from South Africa in 1915.

Which Bengali formed the nationalist trio with Lajpat Rai and Tilak that led the boycott of British goods after 1905?

Bipin Chandra Pal gave the trio its rhyming tag, 'Lal, Bal, Pal'; the three drove Swadeshi boycotts from 1906 to 1918, until Tilak's arrest and Pal's retirement drained the movement.

Which word did Bhagat Singh's group add to the Hindustan Republican Association's name at a 1928 Delhi meeting?

'Socialist' arrived with the Russian Revolution's influence on Bhagat Singh; where the HRA's manifesto had demanded universal suffrage, the renamed HSRA's spoke of the 'dictatorship of the proletariat'.

Which Sutlej village near Ferozepur, where Bhagat Singh was cremated, is also the cremation site of Batukeshwar Dutt?

Hussainiwala ended up across the border at Partition and was swapped back to India in 1961 for twelve villages; the spot now hosts a border flag ceremony and a martyrs' memorial built in 1968.

In which Maharashtra prison did Nehru write 'The Discovery of India' during his 1942–45 internment?

Ahmednagar Fort held the whole Congress Working Committee after the Quit India arrests, and Nehru credited fellow prisoners with shaping the book's sweep through Indian history and philosophy.

Which organisation did C. R. Das and Motilal Nehru form in January 1923 to contest council elections from within?

The Swaraj Party was born of anger at Gandhi's halting of mass resistance after Chauri Chaura; it won 45 of 145 council seats in 1923 and faded after Das died in 1925.

Which Japanese steamer, chartered by Gurdit Singh, brought 376 Indians to Vancouver in 1914 only to be turned away?

The Komagata Maru sat in Burrard Inlet for two months while officials cut off food and water; the ship's return to Calcutta ended in a deadly clash with police at Budge Budge.

Which 22-year-old ran the Secret Congress Radio from Bombay for three months during the 1942 Quit India movement?

Usha Mehta opened every broadcast with 'This is the Congress radio calling from somewhere in India'; police traced the transmitter on 12 November 1942 and jailed her for four years.

Which essay did Bhagat Singh write in Lahore jail in 1930 after a Ghadar veteran tried to revive his faith in God?

Why I Am an Atheist answered Baba Randhir Singh's jibe that fame had made him vain; it ran in Lala Lajpat Rai's weekly The People six months after the hanging.

Aged 15, Chandra Shekhar told a magistrate his name was 'Azad' and his home 'Jail'; what did he call his father?

'Swatantrata', meaning independence, earned the boy 15 lashes; he had been picked up during the Non-cooperation agitation in Benares and kept the name Azad for the rest of his life.

In which Manipur town did INA Colonel Shaukat Malik first raise the tricolour on Indian soil, on 14 April 1944?

Moirang served as the Indian National Army's headquarters during its Imphal campaign and today houses an INA war museum with wartime relics and photographs.